


Axis

by sirius



Category: Johnny's Entertainment, KAT-TUN (Band), NewS (Band)
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-30
Updated: 2012-03-30
Packaged: 2017-11-02 18:16:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/371922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirius/pseuds/sirius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This fic was written in 2008 and includes explicit sexual content.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Axis

It happens slowly, the way these things do. Things gradually shift and the shape of the land changes without anybody realising it. That's a relationship, that's life.

When Kame and Jin have known each other a little while, they declare themselves best friends. All they know of that relationship is that they should do everything together, consult each other on important matters and, above all, always agree on absolutely everything.

So they do, and they are, and when things shift beneath them and between them and around them, they don't notice it. They don't see it, and they don't fight. Best friends are harmonious: they don't fight.

\---

“You're such a kid,” Kame says to Jin at Summary. “You're all kids.”

Jin feels that he should agree with Kame, but it niggles him, nonetheless. “That was fun, though, ne?”

“Idiot,” Kame says. “We have to get serious. I want to debut next year.”

\---

“Nobody said anything about a single,” Jin says. Their first fight: no longer harmonious, no longer best friends. “Seriously, how can you do that? We haven't debuted and you're releasing something. Are you going to leave the band?”

“No!” Kame says, horrified. “It's just for _Nobuta_ , Jin. It's just to accompany the drama. Pi and I-”

“Can't you do it after we've debuted?”

“No.” There's a pause. “I'm sorry. They want to do it now. The band- it'll be soon, Jin. I can feel it.”

Jin looks at Kame for a long while. “What would you say if it were me? You'd be so fucking pissed off, wouldn't you. You wouldn't want me to do this.”

There's a wry smile, which makes Jin want to hit Kame in the face. Not very friendly. “Yeah,” Kame says. “I'd be pretty pissed.”

He's trying to make light of it, and that more than anything else gets Jin's back up.

“Hypocrite,” he hisses, sticking the knife in right where it hurts.

“Jin!” Kame says, snapping back like a snake. “Look, you're just going to have to deal with this. I'm done. This is our career. This is our job, now. We're not kids anymore.”

They go to sleep furious at one another, and like the books say, it doesn't lend itself well to feeling rested.

\---

“Truce,” Jin says, uneasily. Kame nods, equally awkward. They shake hands. It all feels very formal and very unsure.

Kame eats crisps on the bus, and Jin digs around in the bag, helps himself. Kame lets him. That's more of a concession than the apology.

\---

When they get the news about the debut, Jin jumps around the living room, screeching like a demented parrot. Koki watches him with evil fascination, Maru shaking his shoulder, pleased. 

“Kame,” Koki says, poking Kame with his foot. “Where's his off switch?”

Kame gets up, to say something, and Jin envelops him in a hug, and Kame just shrugs at Koki over Jin's shoulder. Grinning so wide he could fit the world in there.

\---

The video for _Real Face_ is long and tiring, and Kame feels irritable but swallows it down. That's called being professional. Jin doesn't seem to feel tired: he bounces around the set, talking to everybody. Kame wants to tell him off for it, it doesn't reflect well on the band, Jin's excited ramblings. 

Halfway through, Ueda walks out into the open air, his feet hurt, he's tired of the song, he'd rather come back tomorrow. Kame feels that he should deal with that, but he doesn't know how, not without being hypocritical. 

Jin goes out and Ueda comes back, some five minutes later, refreshed. There's a place for everything in the band, Kame realises. 

“I'm sorry I thought about telling you off,” Kame says, later. “You were annoying me.” 

“You don't have to apologise for thinking stuff, stupid,” Jin says. “It's just what you do that counts.”

\---

“I want to go to America,” Jin says, and it's sudden, but he tells Kame first because he doesn't want to find out some other way. 

“Me too,” Kame says. “After we're done with this, I think I'll go travelling.”

“No,” Jin says. “I want to go now. I want to take a break.”

Kame's initial reaction is pure and utter panic. What will the band do without Jin? He'll have to lead them through the vocal adjustments, and the fans might not be as happy with the line-up, and he'll have to make up for the loss, and maybe he won't be as good at Jin's particular brand of-

“Kame,” Jin snaps. “Hellooo. Stop doing that. Talk to me.”

“Why?” Kame manages. It wasn't his first question, but it'll do. 

“I'm just tired,” Jin says. “I want to see something other than this. I want more. I just want-”

“To know who you are,” Kame says.

“Yeah,” Jin says. “How did you-”

“You should go,” Kame says, slowly. And in that moment, he realises what being best friends is all about. The absences, not the being together. The losses, not the victories. The worst moments. The moments of letting go, the moments of pulling back. The choking back on a retort in an argument, the apologizing when you don't want to. The sacrifices. The being part of an us, even when the sum total is split across the globe.

“I'm scared,” Jin says.

“Can't go forward, can't go back,” Kame says. “You have to take a step. This is the adult world. If you want this, go for it.”

“You sound like my mother,” Jin says, screwing up his face. 

Kame's heard that before.

\---

Kame doesn't see Jin the day before he leaves for LA, or on the day itself. He sees him a few days before that and pretends that things are as they always were. They go out for food and then go back to Jin's, and Jin beats him fifteen times at the stupid car-racing game Yamapi got him for his birthday. 

They drink, toasting the evening. Nobody mentions America, until Kame opens his stupid mouth-

“Are you intending to keep up with what the band's doing? I can update you if you want.”

“I don't know,” Jin says, honestly. “I don't think it's a break if I'm involved. I'll get involved.”

“Okay,” Kame says, nodding, drinking. “You'll keep in touch with me, though?”

“Yeah,” Jin says. “'Course.”

“Are you-”

“Yes.”

“Don't be,” Kame says. “It'll all work out.”

“A big part of me wants to feel that the band won't work without me,” Jin says. “I know that's childish, but it's hard. I want to be irreplaceable. I want-”

“You want your place in it to mean something,” Kame says. “We haven't all worked this hard to be forgettable. I get that. But the band is going to work, Jin. I'm going to pull it through this. I won't have us be like NEWS. We're going to release singles. We're going to keep going.”

“I know,” Jin says. “You're the leader, right.”

“Yeah,” Kame says. “Look-”

“If I went to your bed, what would you do?” Jin asks, his eyes suddenly round, curious. He doesn't look pissed off. He looks different. The ground has changed, somewhere. Maybe it's been changing for years, Kame doesn't know. Minutes pass and he realises that he hasn't answered Jin's question.

“I'd sleep on the sofa,” he says, mumbles, because it's the only answer he can think of. 

“Okay,” Jin says, taking another drink. “Of course you would.”

\---

They don't keep in touch. The band gets busy and Jin's drunk whenever Kame calls, so Kame stops calling. Occasionally, he e-mails him song lyrics. Jin watches the videos on YouTube and feels a weird sense of pride. Across the oceans, the world still turns. It's funny. Somehow, without him being there, it feels as though the band is in stasis. Until he watches the videos and hears the songs, and he remembers that life goes on. 

He considers apologizing to Kame for the last time they were together, but he doesn't know how. Their friendship is this weird, evolving thing, and Jin doesn't think that he did anything wrong. Kame has weird barriers but Jin's always pushing past them and he doesn't think it's a problem. He's not going to apologise because Kame wouldn't say 'yes'. 

Sometimes, he thinks about it when he gets off at night, when he's too awake to rest and he's too horny to think. He thinks about Kame's dark eyes and the line of his jaw and the way his hair would fall into his eyes as he sucked Jin off, somehow anxious and arrogant all at once. 

He murmurs Kame's name when he comes because he can. In Japan, he had to hide it. Here, it doesn't seem to matter. The secrets evaporate into the air, no longer dirty, no longer suspect. America is a vacuum. Sometimes, Jin yearns for the ridiculous thrill of breaking the rules. Of lying in a hotel room in the bed beside Kame, his hand halting whenever Kame turned over. The sandpaper-scream of stopping when he was close, lying with his breath trapped behind gritted teeth. The stupid joy of mouthing Kame's name silently, in the dark.

\---

The band comes to New York. Jin and Koki argue it out, because Koki's got a grudge that's months old. 

“I couldn't stay,” Jin says, quiet where Koki yells, trying to negotiate the pace. Jin and Koki arguing is like falling plates. Destruction is inevitable. Jin and Kame argue like cats, swatting each other in the dark. Mostly it doesn't hurt but sometimes someone gets a real dig in. 

“Is this about Kame?”

“No,” Jin says. Then, “yes.”

“Does he know?”

“Yes.” Jin says. Then, “no.”

\---

When he returns, he's so afraid. So jet-lagged, so tired, and so frightened. There's paparazzi at the airport, ten million people talking about hair and make-up and what to say in the press conference, and no, no, of course he can't sleep first. He'll have to make the best of things. He pulls his sunglasses down and tries to remember what this was like when it happened every day.

Koki meets him first, and Jin gives him a smile that wobbles like jelly behind glass. Koki hugs him, mutters in his ear. _It'll be fine. Welcome back_.

Jin's afraid to face Kame, a bit. They talked in New York, but about nothing. Like a business trip. Only together a day, what would be the point in getting serious?

They do the press conference. Kame talks about the band and their future aspirations, and in a way it's like Jin never left. He remembers this all too well: Kame holding up the fort, being approximately 41 instead of 21. Jin being back means a complete unit once more. It's just a matter of numeric consistency. Now they can do better harmonies. Now they can go forth as a six-piece, as one, all that jazz.

“It feels as though the thorn in my side is gone,” Kame says.

\---

Jin is happy to be back. He falls back into the swing of things easily. 

The funny thing is that being the leader allowed Kame to let go of the reins, a bit. Jin can see that when he watches the band together. Kame isn't as uptight. He doesn't try to control things as much. He leads only when he has to. 

“You're being a kid,” Jin says, watching Kame and Koki play cards on the _Keep The Faith_ shoot. Kame has one stuck to his forehead, and Junno is throwing bits of paper at him, trying to hit it. 

Kame slants his eyes over. “I learnt from the best,” he says, and Jin grins.

\---

As Kame grows out of himself, Jin grows into himself. The weird thing is that Jin went thousands of miles away and came back unchanged. Kame didn't go anywhere and everything feels new, everything feels different and promising and right, for the first time. 

He wonders which one of them had a break, after all. Jin went away to change, but it's Kame that did. There's no sense to be made of that.

\---

In Okinawa, they stay up late playing _Truth or Dare_. They're drunk and they'll hate themselves for it on the bus the next day, but it's not enough to stop them.

“Sexual fantasies!” Koki crows, knocking over his beer bottle. “Everyone! Everyone has to fucking answer, or I'm gonna dare you to run around outside naked!”

“A girl that puns,” Junno says, sadly. “At 5.05pm, she'd say, oh, let's go have fun now...”

Everybody laughs, to spare Junno's feelings.

“Let's hear Kame's,” Maru says, nudging Kame, who is quiet and amused and shy. 

“Fuck,” Jin says, laughing. “This'll be good.”

“Fuck off,” Kame says, hitting him on his foot, the only part he can reach. “Actually, I-”

“I have fantasies about doing it the other way around on the bed,” Jin says, and Koki creases up. 

Kame climbs through the circle and sits on Jin, pulling him close and covering his mouth with his hand. Jin chews his fingers but Kame carries on, that's what leaders do, after all. 

“I am a dominant personality,” he says, but that's as far as he gets before Maru bursts out laughing and ruins it.

\---

“Things aren't good for you, are they?” Kame says. It's nearly Christmas, nearly Countdown. In a sense, Jin can't wait to get rid of 2007. He feels unsettled and incomplete. Like a bit of pottery that was put in an oven to be fixed and taken out before it was done. He feels like he's melting, like clay. He doesn't know how to stop that. How to become a person again.

Or how to say as much without sounding stupid. 

“No,” he says. “They're not.”

“What do you need?”

Jin smiles, wryly and sad. “You to stop doing this. Stop trying to work me out. I need to be my own person. I need to be independent.”

“Jin,” Kame says. “When you went away, a lot of things began to make sense. You cloud the issue. You're so fucking intense. Chill out a bit. Stop thinking so much. Just take every day, alright? Take every day.”

“I'm sorry that I asked you to sleep with me,” Jin says. “I was lonely. I needed someone. It was wrong.”

“Okay,” Kame says, nodding. “Honestly, I'm sorry that I said 'no'.”

“Fuck off,” Jin says. Then, “you didn't say 'no'. You just changed the subject.”

“I did,” Kame says. “Well, I thought it.”

“Thoughts don't count. I've told you that before.”

“Oh, don't they?” Kame says, idly. “I was going to tell you what I was thinking right now, but I won't, then.”

“You're not thinking anything dirty, anyway,” Jin teases. “You're probably thinking about something really...missionary. Something fucking tame. You're so cute.”

Kame's eyes are dark and his eyebrows are raised and the combination is tantalizing. Jin grins, poking tongue into cheek. 

“Actually,” Kame says. “I was talking about you, in Okinawa. When I said I was-”

“A dominant personality,” Jin remembers, giggling. “I think everybody's got that memo, Kame. Really.”

“I was talking about _you_.” Kame says, jaw set.

It takes a while for it to sink in. “You want to-”

“ _Yes_.”

\---

When he finds out that he, Jin, Ryo and Yamapi are performing _Seishun Amigo_ at Countdown, it gives Kame an idea.

\---

“If you can't handle this-” Kame says, as Ryo's jaw scrapes the floor and Yamapi looks quietly intrigued.

“How did you-” Ryo is saying, looking at Yamapi. “Did you tell him?”

“No,” Yamapi says. “I wouldn't tell him. Jin's the only one who knows.”

“Jin knows?!”

“Of course Jin knows about us. Jin knows everything. He doesn't care, Ryo. He's not bothered.”

“This isn't about you two,” Kame interrupts, frustrated. “I didn't know about you and Yamapi and I didn't particularly need to know, either, thanks. It's about Jin. I just want you both there.”

“You're a kinky bastard,” Ryo says, and Yamapi swats him. 

“He's not very happy at the moment,” Yamapi says. 

“No,” Kame agrees. “I think it'll cheer him up.”

“You could just buy him a card,” Ryo says. 

“Okay,” Kame says, looking over his shoulder. “Look. I'm offering both of you the chance to get in with Jin and me. It's going to be hot, it's going to be- it's going to be a fucking good night, alright? Do you want in, or not? That's all I want to know.”

Ryo looks at him, deadpan. “Let me guess. You're in charge.”

Kame meets his eyes, and grins. 

Yamapi smirks, on the outside, like a shark. “Count me in,” he says.

\---

“Come home with me afterwards,” Kame says, in Jin's ear, before they go on. “I've got a surprise for you.”

“Okay,” Jin says. “What is it?”

“I'm not telling you. That's the whole point.” Kame says, shaking his head. He keeps looking at Ryo, and Yamapi, who are shifting about with suspicious looks on their faces.

“Is it a dirty surprise?” Jin says, moving in close. Ryo looks at Yamapi, who begins to grin. 

“Yes,” Kame hisses. “Now shut up. Someone will hear you.”

“I think Yamapi can hear me,” Jin says. “Pi? Can you hear what I'm saying?”

“Yes,” Yamapi says, droll.

“See,” Jin says. “Now you've told them you've got a dirty surprise for me. Guess I've got some explaining to do-”

“Alright, alright,” Kame says, “They're involved. Now go away. Go and be you somewhere else.”

Jin grins, twice, and heads off with Ryo. 

“He's so bossy,” Ryo remarks, loudly, and Yamapi has to hold Kame back by the shoulder.

\---

As they're about to go on, it occurs to Jin that every person he's about to go on stage with is going to be naked later, and probably under his command.

He fluffs up the beginning of the routine, and Ryo corrects him with an amused glare.

\---

Yamapi and Ryo are made to wait in Kame's living room, which is fine because Kame has satellite television and Ryo's too nervous to do anything other than make snide remarks about baseball. Yamapi raids Kame's fridge and neither of them talk about what they're doing there. They think, of course, about all sorts of interesting images, but talking about it would make it...real.

\---

Jin is like a yo-yo on speed. He's sitting on the bed, waiting for his surprise, the brightest Kame's seen him in weeks. It's a shame, really, all things considered. 

“Lie back down,” Kame says, as he circles the room. He's wearing a tie and he's loosening it, because Jin has a big thing about ties, he's noticed. 

Jin looks at Kame, slowly. He doesn't move. 

“Lie. Back. Down.” Kame enunciates, as though the words don't taste very nice, and Jin does. He can feel himself hardening already, and Kame's barely started. 

“Undress,” Kame says, and so Jin begins, with shaking hands. 

“When you went to America,” Kame says, still circling, still loosening the knot. “Do you know how often I thought about you?”

Jin remains silent, inquisitive. His hands are trembling on his belt buckle.

“I missed that we used to share a room. And you used to lie in the bed next to mine, and get yourself off. I heard you. It scared the living fuck out of me, but I heard you. I missed that. I thought about that a lot.”

Jin swallows.

“Did you continue to do that, in America?” Kame looks at Jin. There's a silent approval in his face.

“Yes,” Jin says, the word coming out edgy. 

“And were you brave enough to say it? You wouldn't have had to swallow it down over there. Did you lie there, in your bedroom, and get yourself off and finally say my fucking name, Jin?”

Jin swallows, there's an inch of a moan in his throat and he'll be damned before he lets Kame hear that. “No,” he says.

“Oh,” Kame says, lightly. “Well, maybe I'll leave you to it, then.”

“What?” Jin says, trousers half off. “What? Hang on-”

“No, well, it's just,” Kame says, a little glint in his eye. “I kind of wanted you to say my name, so. Oh well. I'll give you some time alone, if that's what you need.”

Jin lies back, fuming. Kame grins, climbs onto the bed, takes Jin's trousers from him. 

“You can leave the shirt on,” he says, “hot, I like it.”

He shifts Jin's underwear down, and Jin protests, then. 

“No,” Kame says. “You can't always get your own way, Jin. That's adult life, isn't it? And I'm the leader.”

With that, Kame takes the tie and loops Jin's arms to the bed. 

“How am I supposed to-” Jin begins, absolutely enraged, and Kame just shrugs.

“Well,” he says, adjusting the waistband of Jin's underwear so that it sits, just so, elastic all tight under the head. Enough for a bit of friction. “You'll think of something, I'm sure. I'll come back when I hear my name.”

Ruffling Jin's hair, Kame climbs off the bed and makes for the door.

“When I am free,” Jin says, loftily. “I am taking over the band and kicking you out.”

“That's fine,” Kame says. “As long as you moan my name first.”

\---

“Jin's bad at challenges,” Yamapi comments. Ryo is playing on Jin's racing game, not that he has any competition. Yamapi's as bad as Kame is. 

“I know,” Kame says. “But he's also bad at delayed gratification, so I'll be fine.”

“I could go and check on him,” Ryo says, his voice low. 

“No,” Yamapi says, “I'll do it.”

\---

Yamapi comes back, laughing. There's a torrent of abuse coming behind him from the bedroom. 

“Wow,” he says, through laughter. “He's really pissed.”

Kame looks at Yamapi, smiling. “Pissed-pissed, or horny-pissed?”

“Both,” Yamapi says.

\---

The tiny, dulcet noise can be heard just underneath the noise of the game. Silently (Yamapi's joined the game, and for now the pair of them are distracted), Kame leaves the room.

When he walks through the door, Jin is practically mewling, and Kame closes the door behind him with a triumphant smirk.

“Get your fucking hand on me,” Jin says, without niceties. 

“Wow,” Kame says. “You're gagging for it.”

“No shit,” Jin says, furious with himself and with the tie and with Kame and with the world. “And what the fuck is Yamapi doing? He's supposed to be my friend.”

“I'm supposed to be your friend,” Kame says, running his hand down Jin's cock, which twitches, and Jin moans hard and long and oh, fuck-

“Touch me,” Jin breathes. “Touch me, touch me.”

“I am touching you, idiot,” Kame says. “Fuck.”

“Wrap your hand around-” Jin says, but Kame is, already, and Jin's head falls back and he makes a sound that's loud and clear and pure, and Kame can hear Ryo's attention being drawn away from the game. He strokes Jin a few times, catching liquid from the tip, licking the back of his thumb when Ryo puts his head around the door. 

“Five minutes,” Kame says, around his thumb.

“Somebody had better be about to fuck me,” Jin says, rude and horny and completely incapable of hiding either one. “I'm serious.”

“And people say I'm bossy,” Kame says, shifting Jin down by the hips.

\---

“Have you done this before?” Jin asks, as Kame tips lube into his hand.

“No,” Kame says, with all the air of somebody who doesn't think it matters. “Why?”

“Just wondering,” Jin says. “Do you need me to-”

“No,” Kame says. “Thanks. Just tell me what's good.”

“You,” Jin says, cheekily, and Kame smiles. 

And when Jin tips his hips up and breathes _yes_ , Kame smiles more. He doesn't need to know how to do something to do it. He just needs to know what to do. It's friendship, it's life. Knowing what to do to make somebody whole again. With Jin, it's simple. He just needs sex, something tangible and the rush of blood through the body. Kame needed the most important person in his world to move 6,000 miles away in order to find himself. Kame will do anything that Jin needs him to do. 

“Do it, fucking do it-”

Jin is thrashing, quickly, swearing into the pillow. He's pulling the ties above his head loose, but Kame doesn't care. He watches the knot as he slowly pushes inside, watches Jin's hands clench and turn and writhe. And he waits, and he waits, and he waits, until Jin is making soft aching sounds and then he moves, and the sounds get louder, and louder, and louder. 

Neither of them notice Ryo and Yamapi, not until the pair of them are on the bed too. Jin opens his eyes as Yamapi lies down beside him, full stretch. Ryo takes the queue, lies down the other side. The bed is just about big enough. Ryo doesn't know what he's doing, that much is obvious, but Yamapi does, and Ryo follows his lead the way Kame follows Jin's. 

“Touch him,” Kame says to Yamapi, and Jin moans approval. Yamapi strokes the line of Jin's hip, reaches for his cock, strokes it slowly. 

Kame turns to Ryo, simple, “don't touch him.” Jin's less approving, and Ryo less again, but Kame's in his element and he grins. His hair sticks to his face and his legs ache and his arms are tired but there's nothing like this, the purity of the sensation, the need and the completion and the absolutely everything, tied up in a moment. Jin looks at him and his eyes are so dark, so dark and so needy and so true that Kame wishes he'd been able to see this before. Wishes he'd made the right move years ago. 

“Harder,” he says, to Yamapi. “Follow my pace.”

“Fuck-” Jin spits, grabbing hold of the back of Ryo's hair. “Don't listen to him,” he says to Yamapi. “Oh, fuck, I hate you both, I hate you fucking bo-”

And Ryo doesn't do what Kame says because obedience isn't Ryo's thing, Ryo bites along Jin's jawbone, watching Kame out of the corner of his eyes. Kame doesn't respond: he's lost in it, completely lost in it. As Kame fucks and Jin pushes back, and Yamapi holds Jin's cock in his hands and Ryo holds Jin's face in his palm, the four of them find a weird synchrony, a weird kind of turning that's perfectly harmonious. They're all playing Jin in various different ways, and the one sound that's louder than all the rest is the music: Jin's voice, so clear and so good. Beneath, Kame grunts and Yamapi is gritting his teeth and Ryo's muttering curse words, but the purest sound in the world is Jin's need to have everybody that he loves right there, in this one, perfect moment. 

And when he throws his head back, Yamapi on one side, Ryo on the other and Kame, head buried in Jin's collarbone, his mouth on his neck, Jin isn't aware of anything but the four of them. The rest of the universe fades into the distance, and the path before him is crystal clear.

\---

A month later, they fall out of bed at 4am to get on the bus. The day ahead is long: they've got to film _Lips_ , and they've not had much sleep. Jin is zoned out, full of sex and sleepiness, but Kame wakes up refreshed and makes sure that everyone is ready to leave by 5.

They get on the bus, Jin lagging behind as he always does. Ueda comes out last and hands his bag to Junno, who obediently goes to find somewhere to put it.

Jin's eyes slant between Ueda and Junno, and he catches Kame's gaze last.

“Don't even think about it,” Kame grunts. “Get on the bus.”

“Think about what?” Junno says, bag deposited, job done.

“Well,” Jin says, looking at his watch. “It's nearly 5.05, Junno.”


End file.
